


Simply Having a Wonderful Christmastime (More or Less)

by speccygeekgrrl



Series: lovers from the moon [18]
Category: Mystery Science Theater 3000
Genre: Baby's First Word, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Photos, Family, Family Fluff, First Christmas, Kinga's just in it for the likes, Multi, dressing up like idiots for Christmas photos is so on brand for them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-24 09:12:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17097752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speccygeekgrrl/pseuds/speccygeekgrrl
Summary: It's Katalin's first Christmas, so of course a stupid photoshoot is exactly what Max and Jonah rope Kinga into doing. It takes a bribe for her to go along with it, but what else is new. Kat's got something to say about it, to everyone's surprise.





	Simply Having a Wonderful Christmastime (More or Less)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Tropemas challenge. I probably won't go through all 12 prompts, but "family/kids/next gen" is what I'm doing here already, so why not take advantage of it?

"What do you think you're doing?" Max and Jonah both looked over guiltily at the sound of their wife's voice as she came into the living room. Jonah tweaked the antlers on the hood of the reindeer onesie they'd dressed Katalin in and offered her a smile.

"We're doing it for the likes, you should understand that."

"I'm not asking about the baby, I'm asking about the two of you," Kinga said with a roll of her eyes. Max reached up to fiddle with his elf ear headband under a jaunty red and green hat, and Jonah didn't have the sense to look abashed about being decked out in a Santa hat and a red cardigan with white trim that Max had knitted for him. "Were you just not planning on including me in whatever shenanigans these are?"

"We were going to come get you once everything was set so you had to spend the least amount of time possible expressing holiday cheer," Max said, and tossed her another knitted thing that she discovered was a Christmas tree hat with actual colored lights woven into it. "Go grab your green shirt."

"You have _got_ to be kidding me." She looked up from the hat to find both of them giving her the puppy eyes, and she huffed. "Oh, come _on_ , I'm sick of the two of you ganging up on me."

"That's the polar opposite of what you said literally last night," Jonah pointed out, and Max snorted. 

"You already know you're not allowed to use anything I say in the heat of the moment against me," she said.

"That rule was voted down by the majority," Max said, and she huffed again and left the room. Katalin waved her hands after her.

"Mamamamamama," she babbled, and Jonah bounced her on his knee.

"Don't worry, Mama's coming back... I hope," he said.

"She'll be back," Max said confidently. "She'll make us pay for this later, but she'll be back."

"Dadada?" 

"Yeah, babycakes, I'm right here," Max said, holding out a finger for her to grab onto. "And you are the cutest little reindeer I've ever seen."

"Here," Jonah said, passing the baby over to him entirely. He reached around the side of the couch to grab a tinsel garland and a necklace of Christmas lights that he switched on, and grinned. "She'll agree to these pretty easily once she's already halfway there, right?"

"Theoretically," Max said. Katalin grabbed for the lights and missed.

"Papapapa!" She grabbed for them again, and Jonah laughed and held them out, and the third time she caught them and pulled. 

"This might be instilling bad habits," Max said, but didn't stop her. "Next year she might yank down the tree."

"This year we thought the cat would yank down the tree, but she's left it alone so far," Jonah said.

"The cat isn't Kinga's daughter," Max pointed out, and Jonah conceded with a tilt of his head and a snort of laughter. "And she should be walking by this time next year."

"That's true," Jonah said, and he reached up to ruffle Kat's curly hair. "Did you ever yank down the tree when you were small?"

"No, I was always happy to just sit under it and look at the lights," Max said. "But I remember re-decorating it twice when Kinga pulled it down." Kat tried to put the lights in her mouth and he gently pulled them out of her grip and gave her a pacifier instead. She blinked up at him and he leaned down to kiss her forehead. "Even the year there was a baby gate around the tree. But she's always been an evil genius."

"Well, let's hope she gets her holiday spirit from you, then."

"This is ridiculous," Kinga said, lip curled in a playful sneer as she came back into the room— in green, with the lit up hat on her head. "The two of you are ridiculous."

"Uh, no, the four of us are ridiculous," Max said, lifting the baby a little. "You can't pin this all on just me and Jonah any more. We've conscripted Kat and you're coming along for the ride."

"This is extortion," she said.

"Factually incorrect," Jonah said. "We never issued any kind of threat. As if either of us would threaten you." Kinga huffed and inserted herself on the couch on Jonah's other side, and he grinned and draped the tinsel across her like a sash. "You know we're all about the carrot and not the stick."

"What's my carrot for going along with this, then?"

"Name your price, dear," Max said as Jonah looped the necklace of lights around her too. "I thought the likes were enough of a reward for you, but if you need a treat to sit here and smile..."

"I want gingerbread," she said immediately. "The soft kind. Extra gingery." 

"Well, yeah, did you forget that I was planning on doing the baking tonight?"

"No. I just want you to make it to my specifications."

"Which is different from how I make any other baked good how, exactly? I've been calibrating my baking to your taste buds literally since I started baking. You really don't need to give me instructions. I know what I'm doing already."

"Yeah, yeah," she said, rolling her eyes but with a fond smirk tilting her lips. "Now are we taking pictures or did you just dress me up like an idiot for the fun of it?"

"Here," Max said, and settled Katalin on her mother's lap. 

"Mama!" Katalin spat out her pacifier and dropped her head against Kinga's chest, fascinated with the lights right in front of her face now. "Mama light?"

"...what?" Jonah said, looking over with wide eyes. "Did she just say...?"

"Her first real word?" Max looked stunned. "I heard it."

"Somebody's precocious," Kinga cooed, twisting her fingers in the strand of lights and dancing them in front of Katalin. "Does Kat like the pretty lights?"

"Light!" Chubby baby hands reached for the lights, and Kinga let her grab them.

"Eight months, wow," Jonah said. "I didn't say my first word until I was fourteen months."

"I was a year old," Max said, "but Kinga was nine months when she said 'purple' for the first time."

"Go figure that was her first word," Jonah said, and Kinga shrugged.

"I might be crazy, but I'm consistent," she said, and then squawked when Kat yanked on the lights. "Ow! Come on, let's get on with this before she tears this thing off my neck." Max grabbed the selfie stick off the coffee table and stuck his phone into it before wielding it with the expertise he'd gained over the last year, leaning into Jonah and beaming. On Jonah's other side, Kinga sat up straight so her stupid tree hat would look right, bouncing Kat on her lap to make her laugh.

Ten minutes and thirty pictures later, Kinga tore the hat off and tossed it over the side of the couch. Kat stuffed the light necklace into her mouth and Kinga gently extracted it, then twisted the necklace around her wrist and let Kat play with it in a more controlled fashion. "That's as festive as I'm going to get," she said. "I hope that was sufficient."

"You have earned your gingerbread," Max agreed, taking off the elf ears but replacing the hat. "I'll start making it once I go through these pictures, okay?"

"No," Kinga said. "Give your phone to Jonah. He's better at image editing than you anyways."

"Ouch," Max said, one hand pressed to his chest in mock offense. "I see how it is. I'm only good for baking, huh?"

"You are good for a lot more than baking," Jonah said, accepting Max's phone with a smile up at him. "But you kind of are the house husband here."

"I'm totally okay with that," Max said. "I do make this place pretty cozy."

"You are the coziest," Kinga agreed. 

"Dada?" Katalin held up her arms, and Max leaned down to kiss her head. "Dada!" she insisted when he didn't pick her up, and he laughed and lifted her out of Kinga's arms.

"Okay, princess. One dance and then Dada's got to go make Mama happy, okay?" Kinga sat back and watched with a grin as Max spun their daughter around the living room to the sound of baby laughter. Jonah nudged her shoulder with his.

"You want to pick which pictures we put up?"

"Uh, obviously," she said, stealing Max's phone out of his hand. "You always pick the goofiest ones."

"I don't know why you'd expect me to do anything else."

"I don't expect you to do anything else." She switched over to the camera and started filming Max dancing around with Katalin and humming "Walking in a Winter Wonderland" only slightly off-key. "But our lives are better than anything I knew to expect," she added softly, and Jonah wrapped an arm around her and squeezed her.


End file.
